


love is the only thing (that's gonna get us through)

by SophiaCatherine



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Multi, each chapter tagged with ship, set in the flash 'verse, unconnected drabbles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-11
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-05-21 02:59:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14907050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SophiaCatherine/pseuds/SophiaCatherine
Summary: The Flashdrabbles first posted on tumblr. Each chapter heading shows pairing (or gen).





	1. The Monster (ColdWestAllen - Leonard Snart/Iris West/Barry Allen)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coldwestallen Week, Day 3 - Theme: Paranormal

A scream erupts from the basement. There’s just a hint of the otherworldly about it, Len thinks, as he clicks another link on Picture News.

Iris darts to the top of the stairs, leaning so far over that she stumbles and has to grab the bannister to steady herself. “Babe?” she calls out. “You okay?”

There’s a rustling of sudden movement, as though someone had been standing stock still then bolted. Then Barry calls back up. “Uh. Yeah? I thought I saw something - you know -  _weird_. It’s fine.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” he croaks. “I’ll be right up.”

Len does not look up from his comfy chair, aiming for a sense of proficient nonchalance. “What’s the etiquette for when he goes off the deep end over probably-not-actually-supernatural stuff?”

Iris hums, sipping her coffee by the bannister, still peering down into the darkness. “Not sure anymore. He’s not done it for a while.” 

He clicks on a link and shrugs. “Could just be a rogue meta.”

She turns a pointed look at him. “You think that’s better than a ghost?”

“…Yes?”

Iris stares at him from under arched eyebrows. “Hi, Len. Let me introduce you to Barry. If we seriously have to have a ‘try not to mention the Reverse Flash’ conversation, clearly  _I’m_  deciding on the etiquette.”

He considers being offended that someone else is making the plan, but - well, that someone is Iris. Len concedes the point with a single nod. “Still.” He clicks another link and looks back at the screen. “Speaking as someone who’s come back from the dead and actually  _been_  a ghost, I think I should get dibs on apparition-related trauma.”

She breaks a smile and reaches over to pat his shoulder in a way that absolutely does not get his heart racing like he’s twenty again. “If jokes are helping you through it, carry on, dear.  _Barry?_ ” _s_ he calls out again.

Silence.

Then, another scream.

This time there’s a name attached, though Len isn’t sure whose it is and he doesn’t care. That’s the shout of an actually  _terrified_  Barry, not just a briefly spooked one. And given that the shouter in question has super-speed… He’s jumping the back of the couch and down the stairs so fast he could give the Flash a very literal run for his money.

Barry’s frozen in place at the foot of the stairs. Len grabs his shoulders. “Are you –”

Barry whirls around and points.

“Oh good Lord,” Len says. He takes a step back, carefully positioning himself behind the one of them that has the superpowers. “Um. Iris…?”

She’s already behind them, her eyes darting around in the half-light. “What?!”

The Flash, valiant defender of Central City, shudders.

Captain Cold, hero of the Oculus, points.

Iris West-Allen, possessor of neither meta powers nor advanced tech, snorts a laugh. She picks up the horrifying creature and carries it to the dusty basement window, releasing it with a “Bye-bye, Mr Spider. Sorry about those two.”

“See?” Barry says approvingly. “That’s the kind of bravery that got her put in charge of Team Flash.”

“No.” Iris comes back and plants a kiss on his forehead. “That was my ability to think clearly in a crisis.” She looks between them both, eyebrows raised in evident amusement. “Apparently something that you  _heroes_  both lack.”

“It was really big!” Barry whines.

“I know, hon,” she says sympathetically. “Coffee?” She swans upstairs, dusting her hand across Len’s chest as she passes him. He doesn’t know whether his skipped heartbeat is her fault, or the spider’s.

“You should have seen me when I lived alone,” Barry sighs. “I called her to drive over and get rid of one, when I was in college.” 

“So?”

“She wasn’t living in Central at the time. She had to drive for three hours.”

Len laughs. “Why do you think I always shared a place with Mick?”

Barry grins.

“Hello?” Iris yells down at them. “Do you want to reward your brave rescuer, or not?”

Len decides that, yes, he probably does.


	2. The Injury (ColdWestAllen - Leonard Snart/Barry Allen/Iris West)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coldwestallen Week, Day 5 - Theme: Medical

“It’s bleeding,” Barry says forlornly, cradling his finger against his chest.

“Give it two minutes,” Iris calls from the next room. “You have healing powers.”

Her utter betrayal stings. Barry whines.

“Well, she’s not wrong.” Len shrugs as he keeps stirring the soup.

Barry attempts a glare. Glaring at Len isn’t what it used to be. “Yes,  _thank you_ , I’m aware of what my powers are. You gonna help or what?” He holds out his finger pitifully. “Ow,” he says.

Len’s eyebrows creep up. “Barry. You’ve survived significantly worse injuries than a cut finger. A number of of them from me,” he mutters, trailing off into a suddenly inscrutable expression.

Barry ignores him and pouts at his finger.

Putting down the spoon, Len comes over to look. He pokes Barry’s finger, ever so gently.

“Owww.”

“It’s fine,” Len says, returning to the stove.

“It’s still bleeding!

“Because it’s only been 30 seconds,” Len replies in a tone of strained patience.

“That’s a long time for me!”

Len  _looks_  at him. “You can’t use that excuse to whine about everything!”

There’s a laugh behind them, and they turn, together, to see Iris leaning against the kitchen door frame. “I swear, there was less bickering when you –” she nods at Len – “were his nemesis.”

Barry smiles. “There really wasn’t. It was just sexier bickering.”

“Oh, please.” Len puts the spoon down again. He advances on Barry, his smirk as predatory as any he ever used on him back in the day. “Our banter in the field was not, by any stretch of the imagination, bickering. And what do you mean, it was sexier  _before_  we were together?”

Barry grins at him, and Len slides in behind Barry, his arms wrapping around him. Barry watches Iris watching from the doorway, a hint of a smile on her face.

Then Len makes a sudden move, and Barry yelps. “Hey, would you watch it? I’m still bleeding here!”

“Oh for pity’s– You want me to get the first aid kit? I’m getting the first aid kit!” As he strides out of the room, Barry hears him muttering, “Less drama living with the fucking Rogues.”

“I want the Band-Aids with Scooby-Doo on,” Barry calls after him.

Iris replaces Len behind Barry, twisting her head around to look at him. Her smile is so fond that he can’t help returning it. “You ever graduating to regular bandages?” she teases.

“Why? I have healing powers.”

She laughs and squeezes him.

Barry holds out his finger to her. “I am mortally wounded and can no longer chop vegetables. Please be superhero sidekick and take over in my time of great need, or dinner will suffer a terrible fate.”

She peers at his finger. “Yeah, that healed while you two goobers were arguing, sweetie.”

He puts effort into his sigh. Then he kisses her.

After a second, she extracts herself. “Sorry, babe, but I have to finish this article by 7. So if you want dinner, you’re doing it yourself.”

He holds onto her hand with a longing look, and she laughs, pulling away slowly until she has to let go.

She’s replaced in the doorway by Len. “I can only find Simpsons Band-Aids.”

“Ooh, gimme.” Barry grabs the packet.

“Vegetables,” Len orders, pointing, and going back to the stove. Barry sighs and sits back down at the counter. “And maybe this time don’t chop them at super speed,” Len adds.

Barry sulks. “You know I’m speed-force-levels of graceful, right?”

“ _Apparently_  not,” Len drawls back.

“Nimrod.”

“Freak.”

“You two start again and I’m going out for dinner on my own,” Iris shouts helpfully.

Len looks over at Barry, and his smirk thaws, suddenly - turning soft, thoughtful. Then he returns his attention to the stove.

“What?” Barry says with a laugh.

“Nothing,” Len says, but the small, secret smile doesn’t go away.

Barry shrugs, trying to repress his own smile. He goes back to chopping veg. Carefully, this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Extra content warning: blood. (Not much!)


	3. The Closet (ColdWestAllen - Leonard Snart/Barry Allen/Iris West)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coldwestallen Week, Day 7: Space

“I don’t understand,” Len says.

“How is this possible?” Iris asks.

“…Huh,” Barry muses.

They’re standing around the hall closet. Out of which a number of items have just fallen. Including a vase, now smashed on the floor. And most of the still-boxed toasters from Mick. And all of the spare pillows.

Len scratches his head. “All I was trying to do was fit the vacuum cleaner back in. It seems to have gotten a little… over-full.”

“I’m just gonna say it,” Iris says, after a moment. Then she turns a panicked look on Barry. “If I say it, will he pun?”

Barry sighs. “He will  _so_ pun, but someone’s gotta say it.”

“Fine,” Iris says, raising her eyes to the ceiling. “There’s no space in the closet.”

Len nods seriously. “Correct. I think this is what happens when the third member of your trio moves into the apartment you rented for two.” 

There’s silence for a minute.

“…Yes?” Len tries.

“We’re not moving until you get the pun out of the way,” Barry says, by way of explanation.

“Might be a little bit beneath me,” Len says, pursing his lips in thought.

Barry shakes his head. “I will never understand you, man.”

Len spins around to face him, beaming. “I’m still an inscrutable mystery?”

“Of course!” Barry reassures, patting him on the arm. “Nearly as much as when you were Captain Cold.” Len pretends not to notice as Barry shakes his head comfortingly at Iris behind Len’s back, or when she grins back.

“You’re not wrong, though,” Iris says. “Three people into an apartment for two does not go. So, serious question, boys. What are we going to do about how there’s no space in the closet?”

 _Set ‘em up, and let ‘em knock themselves down,_  says the cold little super-villain voice inside Len’s head. “Well,” he says out loud, “we’ve been meaning to try… coming out.”

Barry doesn’t look away from the full closet. 

He takes an extended moment, nodding slightly.

Then he turns to Iris. “If I whack him with anything harder than a pillow, you’d frown on that, right?”

“Unfortunately,” Iris says. “You having superpowers, and all.”

“Right. Well. Pass me that pillow.”

She reaches down and retrieves all six of the pillows.

Barry throws them all at Len. Some, Len suspects, at controlled super-speed.

“Hey,” Len says from under the pile of pillows. “There’s a lot more space in there now.”

“We’ll see you downstairs,” Iris says,

“Is one of you going to help me up?”

“No,” Barry says. “Put the vacuum cleaner back in the closet, would you?”

Len huffs. “Okay, this shit just got too domestic for me,” he calls after them. “I’m an inscrutable mystery!”

“A mystery wrapped in a pile of pillows,” Barry calls back in return. “We’ll be downstairs, watching Star Trek.”

Iris pokes him. “America’s Next Top Model.”

“Yeah, but he’ll clean up the mess faster if we say Star Trek.”

“Ooh - if we say Star Wars, will he do the dishes too?”

He snorts. “He won’t believe you if you say Star Wars.” They disappear down the stairs.

Len removes six pillows from about his person and gets up from the floor.

He stares into the closet, calculations starting to spark in the mind that made him a super-villain.

“… _Coming out_ ,” he says under his breath, to no one. “Heh.”

Then he starts work on the Great Closet Plan of 2018. The other two can watch TV without him for twenty minutes.

(He lasts ten, before he starts missing them, follows them downstairs, and slides in between them. His noble superhero on one side and his fearless leader on the other, the glow of the TV ahead. Warm and safe and comfortable, and all kinds of other pesky things he really shouldn’t like, but… 

“This is the worst crock of shit I’ve ever seen. Can we watch Star Trek?”

“If it means you’ll do the dishes.”

“ _Fine_.”)


	4. Ice Skating (Lisa Snart & Leonard Snart)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lisa Snart takes her brother ice skating.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from @thepotatowearsprada on tumblr: "headcanon that Lisa is 100% an olympic level figure skater and Len has tried a bajillion times but he just can't learn how to ice skate"

Lisa Snart, Golden Glider, Bronze-winning figure skater (Winter Olympics, 1998), is doubled over with laughter. And still perfectly balanced on one foot. 

Her brother is dragging himself along the wall at the side of the rink. He’s just picked himself up from the ice, which took four attempts, after making the mistake of letting go.

“Every time,” she chokes out. 

“I’m glad you think this is  _funny_ , sis,” he yells over to her. And, aww, he’s doing his dangerous face, like he thinks he’s making a dramatic impression on anyone. 

Oh, sure - Lenny likes to think he’s the badass of the Snart family, but she’s been watching him wobbling against skating rink walls since he was a teenager. 

(Also, Lenny’s not the Snart who knows what you can do to someone with an ice skate. Not every day, of course. Just when you need to.)

“It’s fine,” he sulks. “I’m in my  _element_.” He grins, clearly expecting a reaction for that one. She does a Salchow jump to spite him, spinning in the air and sticking her tongue out at him. She lands flawlessly, then half-collapses in giggles once more, watching as he again attempts to let go. It doesn’t go so well for him. 

Yeah, the big bad Rogue’s not fooling her. Or the eight-year-olds in hockey gear who snerk at him as they sail past, waving.

A bit later, over hot dogs in the ice rink cafe, she asks, “Why do you still come?” They’re looking down over Central’s skating public. It’s quiet down there on this Thursday afternoon, but she can see an older couple who must be retired figure skaters, and a family whose small children are gliding over the ice with significantly more skill than her doofus brother.

He tilts his head at her, half-smiling. “Never gonna get any better if I don’t practice.”

She laughs, bumping his shoulder with her own. “Lenny. You’re 42. I hate to break it to you, but you’re not going to the Olympics this lifetime. Or even staying upright for more than a minute. Give it up.” 

Her brother shrugs. “You started asking if I want to join you. I’m not gonna  _not_ ,” he murmurs, and ducks his head, apparently finding his beer very interesting all of a sudden.

She’s hit by a memory, from nowhere. 1998. All year, she’d trained like her life depended on it. (Sometimes, on her rarer dark days when she lets herself remember, she thinks maybe it did.) But it didn’t matter how hard she worked - she knew she wasn’t really going to Nagano. 

Then one day Lenny appeared with the money she needed, and she didn’t ask where it came from. 

She’d gone alone, her first time out of the country, crossing Japan on a bus full of mean rich kids whose parents and girlfriends and boyfriends would all be waving banners and flags when they got onto the ice. She was just happy her dad was in prison and couldn’t stop her from going. And Lenny - well, he was a wanted man by then. It was okay.

As they lowered the medal over her pounding heart and she reached for it with shaking hands, she finally looked up. There he was, out in the crowd, beaming at her with the kind of pride she didn’t know anyone could feel for her.

She knew better than ever to talk about it. But… There he was.

She blinks, and slurps up chocolate froth, grinning at him over the straw of her milkshake. “All the same. Next time, just sit in the seats, okay? You can have a beer and pretend you’re actually enjoying yourself.”

“I can’t  _believe_  you’re giving up on me,” he drawls, his eyes sparkling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor rewrites here from the version that first went up on tumblr, as I miscalculated Lisa's age rather stunningly _and_ screwed up Olympic year dates...


	5. Missed (coldwestallen - Leonard Snart/Iris West-Allen/Barry Allen)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from agentmarymargaretskitz - “So, how much have I missed?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for a 5-sentence fic meme on tumblr - ‘You send the first sentence, I’ll write the next 5.’

“So, how much have I missed?” Len asked, finally braving the question he’d been avoiding.

On the right side of his bed, a red-eyed Barry said nothing, just gripping his hand tighter.

On his left, Iris - _oh, his Iris_ \- ever reliable for an honest answer, said, “Three years.”

He met her eyes and didn’t look away. As the STAR Labs monitors beeped around them, no one said anything else for a long time.


	6. Don’t Do That (coldwestallen - Leonard Snart/Barry Allen/Iris West-Allen)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from callionelb: coldwestallen, ‘I wish you wouldn’t do that.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for a 5-sentence fic meme on tumblr - ‘You send the ship and the first sentence, I’ll write the next 5.’

“I wish you wouldn’t do that.”

Barely looking up at him, Len shrugged over his blueprints. “You’ve been complaining that I’m at the safe house all the time, so what am I supposed to do?”

“I don’t know - maybe _not_ lay them all out on the Flash’s dining room table?”

Not stopping on her determined path from the bedroom to the kitchen, Iris said, “Let’s get him an office with a door that locks,” as she passed the table.

“Sensible woman you married. Plausible deniability,” Len conceded, tilting his head affectionately in her direction, while Barry just scowled harder.


End file.
